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October 1, 2017

Cops bust bitcoin racket, seven held

<!– /11440465/Dna_Article_Middle_300x250_BTF –>The Crime Branch of Delhi Police has arrested six people including a woman for allegedly duping buyers on the pretext of selling bitcoin.According to the police, the accused have been identified as Aditya Rajput, Priya Thakur, Sandeep Chauhan, Devender Chauhan, Karamvir Singh and Kunal Sharma. The gang leader Aditya Rajput is a law graduate from Dehradun.“The complainant uploaded his information on a website localbitcoins.com, from which he received a call from a bitcoin dealer Karishma Rajput, her real name is Priya Thakur. He (the complainant) revealed his interest in buying bitcoins which was then available at the rate of Rs 72,000 per bitcoin. He wanted to make the payments through Zebpay.com but Karishma Rajput persuaded him to conduct the transaction in cash,” DCP (Crime Branch) Rajesh Deo said.Delhi police said that Karishma alias Priya, along with her associates called the complainant to a mall situated in East Delhi. After confirming the identity of the complainant they abducted him and took them to a flat in Ghaziabad, where he was robbed of Rs 36 lakhs.“This modus operandi was used to contact interested parties through phone calls and Facebook messages and convince them to deal in cash to buy Bitcoins. Once, they convinced the buyers and called them to the designated place, the other gang members would come into action. These were namely Karamvir, Kunal, Kuldeep Amandeep, Sandeep and Devender who armed with weapons would rob the victim,” Deo added.On further interrogation, the victim revealed that gang took the commission of two more dacoities of 28 lakhs and 8.5 lakh rupees by transferring the bitcoins from his wallet into their own accounts. This, he said, was done by threatening him at gunpoint after the abduction. The gangs he said were using fake identities to escape detection.Apart from these gang members, police are claiming that six other victims have been identified and soon the Delhi police will call them for their statements. Police have also recovered eight mobile phones, numerous SIM cards and jewellery items, along with lakhs of rupees in cash.